Mandie After College
by Callie Mississauga
Summary: Working with Ann M. Martin as a homemaker with a child and a husband after college, Mandie starts a detective agency business.


Mandie Shaw was a work-at-home mom. She owned a home business and had a daughter, Megan Michelle, to take care of while her child's father Adrian went out to work every week day. They lived in upstate New York. Mandie kept herself occupied throughout the day with Megan in her home, sewing, crocheting, knitting, making clothes, doing needlepoint, and gardening. Her business does something very interesting. It solves mysteries and fights crime. She had been doing it since 1914 when she was twenty-six years old after she graduated from her college's graduate school program at twenty-six years of age. She obtained her MBA or master's in business administration from her college in that year with minors in English composition and art history. She was best friends with juvenile literature author Ann M. Martin and they both celebrate the death anniversary of their close mutual friend Paula Danziger every year.

Mandie and Ann enjoyed life staying at home with their children and pets. Whenever something had to be solved or taken cared of in their neighborhood they were the ones to do it. Mandie, a southern belle beauty from North Carolina and Adrian, a handsome gentleman from Ireland, had just purchased their first single-family home together in central New York. Mandie had plans, big plans, to live life as Ann M. Martin and her life with her dog and three cats! Mandie was sure she was going to be just like Ann someday. Sure enough, when Adrian asked her how her gardening was coming along, Mandie could do nothing but blush shyly and respond with a casual "it's going great, thanks" to his sincere question about her daily life in a work-at-home business in the North Carolina mountains while he went away every day to work for a computer scientist in a chemists' corporation.

Problem was, their home had no mysteries that needed solving at the moment. So Mandie promoted herself, her business, and their new home online over the internet to attract customers. Mandie was a graphic designer, a web designer, an heiress, and a writer. There had to be something that needed to be done while they lived in their house. She was doing it for Megan, her daughter, their daughter, with Adrian as Megan's father. Megan was her first and only child. She was a real lady now, and quite proud of such a feat.

"O goody my first customer!" exclaimed Mandie as she saw her neighbor Ann approaching her house.

Ann M. Martin was Mandie Shaw's best and only customer. Mandie enjoyed it very much. Ann always had something for her to do. She loved having Ann in her life, so she wouldn't go bored and kill people. She heard about people who went bored and lonely and ended up becoming nothing but mass murderers at large.

"I'm having trouble finding my watch," complained Ann to Mandie one day. "I can't seem to find my Rolex!"

Ann told Mandie about her beloved Rolex watch that went missing a couple of weeks ago. It was now spring, but Ann could not remember having it in the last weeks of winter. Mandie thought hard. Mandie tried to stop and think.

"Maybe I can help." remarked Mandie about the Rolex watch of Ann's. "Maybe your missing watch can be my first mystery."

Ann was delighted that Mandie was able to help out. Mandie was glad to help her friend Ann.

"Annie is going to love me after I find her missing watch." thought Mandie to herself. "I think I'll go ask her a few questions first."

What should her first question be? There was too much to ponder. Mandie remembered when her grandfather Senator Morton of North Carolina had a beautiful watch to tell time with on his wrist, he always placed it in a jewelry box on his bureau dresser in his bedroom. Nobody was allowed into anybody else's room without explicit permission, so it was impossible for anybody to hold possession of somebody else's wrist watch. Unless Ann had simply misplaced her wrist watch, Mandie had no other questions to ask Annie regarding the lost Rolex.

"Where do you usually keep your watch, Miss Ann?" asked Mandie.

"I usually keep my watch in my musical jewelry box on top of my vanity." answered Ann M. Martin.

"Well, did you wake up one day and found it missing, gone, or what?" asked Mandie, understandingly with huge compassion and empathy.

"Why, yes, I just woke up one morning after putting it away the previous night and POOF it was gone." replied Ann enthusiastically.

Mandie pondered over what she just learned. Megan was entertaining Ann. It was helpful having a daughter to entertain her guests and customers with. It was a big part of her home business as a stay-at-home mom to have children to entertain guests and customers. Without the child, she didn't know what she would do! Her daughter was a blessing, a godsend from heaven, and a sweet little angel at heart. "Do you think that I stole your watch or something Ann, because I would never, ever-" began Mandie before Ann interrupted her immediately with "why, of course not, dear, whatever made you think that?" Mandie sincerely apologized for the feat and returned to her thinking, before she asked, "did you check your laundry? Maybe it's in your pocket!"

Ann M. Martin first checked her own pockets before she asked Mandie to escort her back to her house (she was ageing gracefully, while Mandie was still in her mid or late twenties or early thirties) to check on the laundry in case her wrist watch was in the dirty clothes.

"Sure, of course," said Mandie. "But remember after I solve your mystery you still have to pay me!" She reminded Annie of the mystery that needed solving. What kind of business charges to solve mysteries? Work-at-home, stay-at-home mom businesses, that's what.

Mandie spent years 16-19 in the Charleston Ladies' College's four-year college program in business, English composition, and art history. She then spent two more extra years in the Charleston Ladies' College studying graduate school studies for her MBA in 1908 and 1909. She was impregnant in about 1910. Her daughter Megan was now about four years old and entering kindergarten now in 1914. Now that it was ten years since she left home for college (although she still returned home to visit her family of Shaws and Native Americans for the vacations!) it was a time to celebrate my launching her business at twenty-six years of age.

She kept in touch with her wealthy grandmother Taft and step grandfather Senator Morton back in the backwoods of North Carolina down south. She lived in New York with her Irish husband Adrian and their daughter Megan Michelle. Mandie came from a large Native American family and is one-fourth Cherokee. Her mother Elizabeth and her uncle John who is also her stepfather lived in North Carolina near her grandparents' Asheville mansion with her half siblings and cousins Carol and Carl which she had the pleasure of naming while she was in her first year of college.

Ann's house was clean and pristine, as if Ann had meant for Mandie to come for a short visit to look for a missing watch. Mandie felt welcomed into it as she immediately got down to business at her arrival in Ann's lovely made-up home in upstate New York.

Mandie immediately followed Ann as she checked her laundry in the laundromat and linen closets.

"Oh dear, I think I searched my pockets before, but I will again, and it looks like it's not here," said Ann.

Mandie thought long and hard. Her step grandfather Senator Morton was once an expert on watches, clocks, and time. She remembered back when Morton went through a phase of collecting grandfather clocks and wristwatches from people he knew by friendly acquaintance like Ann. Mandie suggested, "Maybe Senator Morton took it. You're so lucky to be one of the few people he would target, don't you know, Annie."

Ann grimaced and replied, "Morton stole my watch? You think?"

Mandie was sure of it. "Morton would do anything for time telling objects like clocks and watches from people like you, Ann. Trust me. It was him. I'll ask them in my next visit to my Native American extended family's house in North Carolina."

Mandie was also sure she was going to be dealing with Senator Morton and her grandmother Taft a lot in her next visit to her Native American extended family's house in North Carolina. But first, she and Adrian were busy taking care of Megan Michelle in upstate New York near Ann's neck of the woods.


End file.
